Mind effect: The first war
by Antique Nova
Summary: A prequel to Dream or reality. The year is 2174, nine years before the events of the first of the Mass Effect trilogy. Humans are newer to the galaxy than first perceived in the original game, many events have yet to unfold and i know little of this time.
1. Chapter 1: The scientist

**Chapter 1: The scientist**

_'_When in doubt, trust your instincts'

Tingling, spiky electricity coursed its way through my body; my eyes flashed open and revealed me to be in a water tank of some kind - then they clamped shut as the fear of being blinded overcame me. But I noticed my eyes did not sting so I took another peek. Then my vision violently shook as I screamed, releasing a hale of bubbles that blocked my vision; I felt the water tank drop and push me into the glass barrier, nose first - which earned another shout hailed by more bubbles.

Next came the nausea as I felt the tank spin; I tried to open my mouth repeatedly to scream, but bubbles only greeted me. Suddenly I saw a pair of legs, then the torso and then part of a human face squished against the glass that was my prison, my cage.

I immediately regretted my momentary stare as blood and flesh gave way before me in a flash, its presence smeared across the glass. My screams continued as the tank span, until a long clang vibrated through the water; then a shower of sparks and metallic plates blocked my view. A metal pipe slammed its way almost between my eyes, inches from my face; it was separated from me by glass, but then it cracked and I tried wriggling away from its path.

_Oh shit,_ I thought as the crack started to spread.

Then everything went black; I felt a rush of water escape from the tank and my body collided with the cold metallic floor. There was a loud clang, and a gurgled scream erupted from within me as I felt tiny shards of glass impale themselves into my skin. I stopped myself from rolling around and took the pain. Then I swept the surrounding pieces of glass away, crawling out of the wreckage a few seconds later before I inspected my arm.

_ I can deal with it,_ I thought; I pinched out a few pieces of glass, before I squeezed the top of my arm under the armpit to help relieve the pain by numbing it.

That was my plan, anyway, until I saw a bunch of armoured hostiles, shooting not twenty meters away from me.

"OVER HERE!" shouted a woman, crouching behind a crate with a pistol in her hand. She didn't even have her finger on the trigger, I saw; she must have just hastily scavenged it recently for comfort as well as protection.

Suddenly, the shooting stopped and I swung my head back towards the hostiles who now turned their guns on me, but didn't shoot. One of them put a hand over an ear before pointing a finger at me, then ran at me with his buddies.

My eyes widened; _Oh shit,_I thought again, and ran towards the woman who shouted earlier. Who by now was shakily holding her pistol and firing it wildly at the men chasing me.

"Get behind those doors!" she shouted again, before taking her own advice as well. Once we had thrown ourselves through the door, the woman quickly tapped a few buttons on a nearby control panel; an audible click followed and the doors slammed shut , a small red icon appearing over them.

Letting out a loud sigh of relief, the woman slumped to the ground momentarily before coming back to her senses, eyed me carefully.

"Are you in any great pain?" she asked, pointing towards my bare, bleeding arm. Before I answered, I noticed a sudden chill and a giant rush of blood heading towards my face as I looked down - I was naked.

"Ahhhhhh! Don't look!" I cried, immediately placing both hands over my pride.

The woman blushed, before she composed herself once again. "Normally I would introduce myself with a handshake, but I think that moment has passed by now." I smiled.

The woman blushed again, harder than before this time and then looked around and walked over to a piece of... a dead man. _At least it's whole body, not bits of a blasted one,_ i reasoned with myself.

"Help me take some of his clothes off," she said, but I didn't move. My guts churned at the sudden sight of her removing the clothes from a dead man's body. _Wearing them?_ That was even _worse_.

She turned around and noticed my uneasiness, before turning back to the dead body, and I realised that, as grim as this may be, she was numb to it. I was not used to dead bodies, whereas in her profession, she was more or less used to it - minus the blasters and hostile men, of course.

Not wanting to wear a dead man's clothes, I hopefully scanned the room for fatigues and saw nothing. But then I caught the guards on the other side of the door, kneeled down and working on something, and it hit me!

"Hey! Excuse me, but what is your name?" I hurriedly asked.

She hesitated momentarily, before giving it. "Alcina. Alcina Pass."

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><p>Let me know what you think! The second chapter shall be up later tonight! hopefully around 10pm! I just need to upload it and punch in the paragraphs from the beta'd version. Plus i've already started on chapter 3! :P.<p> 


	2. Chapter 2: New plans

**Chapter 2: New plans  
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_'What happens in there stays in there. Got it?'_

"Go! Don't look back!" I urged Alcina as the door exploded, before I shielded myself with my arms. The next thing I knew, hands were on me as I was brutally tackled to the ground. Even worse, I saw one of them reach behind their pouch and produced a sphere object - a grenade.

I panicked at what to do next, but then a crazy idea came to mind - one that I had little time to think about.

"Hey, sexy!" I winked, before I blew my handlers a seductive kiss - they backed off suddenly. Needing no encouragement, I leapt up and sprung towards the grenadier's hand as he threw the grenade; I jammed it into his mouth, then threw him at his comrades, who backed away.

And I ran for my dear life, I dared to look back just once to see both still after me, another peek telling me that Alcina had gone through the air duct that I had pushed her through. Before i was interrupted by my buddies, who still chased after me. I looked again behind as I ran towards a door, on the far end of the other side of the giant hall I was in.

I glanced again behind me and found that the guys were catching up.

Things took turn for the worse - a team of three cut me off from within the corridor that I approached.

The lead man in the new group was a giant and his friends were no different, all heavily armoured and in white with insignias.

Insignias that looked strangely familiar.

"Cerberus! Oh shit!" I cursed.

This group was different, however. They weere holding guns and they weren't afraid to use them.

The leader pointed at me and I slowed down, bracing myself for the shot - even I knew I couldn't dodge a bullet. However, if I was to die here, I would make sure that it wouldn't be easy for my killer. I decided to make one last surge and picked up the pace.

The first shot missed me and I counted myself lucky, but then the other two beside the leader fired their shots behind me and I began to grow curious - were they warning shots?

However, I had little time to dive into my curiosity. I covered the last ten metres between us in a flash, bringing my left foot up at the last moment.

At first the leader brought up his gun to knock me aside, but he realised his mistake too late. I had aimed a kick towards his kidneys, just beside the tiny gap by his elbow, not his chest, and I rammed into him full force. I felt him give way and he instantly dropped to the floor, if only temporarilly, before his mates descended upon me and the downed leader spoke.

"Stop! Our objective is to secure the package. Unharmed," he gritted out, reiterating the last part in a hateful spit towards me. But I just fixed him with an inquisitive stare, feeling compelled to speak.

"You're Cerberus," I stated.

He smiled.

"You're hurt." I smiled.

His disappeared, replaced by a menacing stare.

I held his stare for a few seconds. I knew he couldn't hurt me, since i was in the Mass Effect universe - I knew I had the edge, the knowledge, and I knew I had a bargaining chip. _Not that they would know_.

Maybe that's why he backed off eventually when he found out that my stare was more menacing than his, or maybe because I looked like a madman who knew no fear - which provably wasn't far from the truth, since I could argue my way through anything with the info locked away in my brain.

He held a finger towards his helmet again and a few seconds later, nodded and looked at me again.

"Gotcha boss," he confirmed. "Where's the lab team?" he asked me, his voice cold and menacing.

"What lab team?" I said, taken aback. He looked at me for a second like I was the dumbest thing in the world, before asking again.

"Don't play games with me boy, where. Is. The. Lab. Team?" He reiterated his words by jabbing his finger into my chest.

"I don't know, I just woke up a minute ago and broke out of my tank," I replied, leaving out the part where I met Alcina.

But he was buying none of it. "You got 10 minutes to show me," he said, before he moved towards his mates. Letting go of me, they walked either side of me while the leader walked behind, gun up front and behind my back; as a precaution, the big guy told me that he would tranq me the moment I made to escape.

I however, had no intention of running. I knew Cerberus and knowledge was power, but all I had was curiosity at the moment.

"What are you looking for?" I asked, turning around as I walked.

He glared at me before pushing me with his gun. "Get moving and don't ask more stupid questions," he warned, but I persisted.

"If I don't know what you're looking for, what you're SPECIFICALLY looking for, how do I know what I'm looking for?" I tried again.

He looked at me again, before deciding that there was no harm in doing so, "A female member of the lab team. She's the only female in the team," he said, his voice slightly hesitant.

_Alcina._

I eyed him and he caught my stare. "You've seen her!"

I tilted my head; I needed to be careful. "What's her name?" I asked.

He looked at me as if he couldn't believe what was coming out of my mouth; naked, weak and a prisoner was all I was to him, and yet I did not seem to be scared of him. "Show me where you saw her!" he demanded, his temper clearly running out.

"Look. Do you want to find her quickly or not? In fact, do you want to find her at all?"

I almost immediately regretted saying that as veins started popping all over his head, until he calmed down momentarilly and nodded.

His eyes moved towards his side as if to acknowledge orders through his earpiece.

"Her name is Alcina Pass."

Now that struck a chord with me, and he caught my reaction.

"Where is she?" he now demanded.

"She's here!" a voice shouted, muffled by echoes as we looked around for the source of it. However, we didn't need to.

"Hello there Cerberus minions. We have your precious scientist. The immaculate Alcina Pass. Say hi!" he gloated in a creepy voice; having it blasted throughout the entire area didn't help one bit.

"Release me you...!" she shouted, before her voice was muffled.

"My my, she's a feisty one, but down to business. Give me the specimen or die. You have ten minutes. Ta daaa." He laughed and cut the voice right after. That voice sounded familiar, but I dismissed it. _I'm just having a bad day, and I bet he doesn't even sound like that in person,_ I thought.

"Crazy bastard," one of my handlers said.

"Aye," said the other. But the leader just looked at me, and a plan formed in my head, a crazy plan.

Barely ten minutes later, I heard one say, "My Lord, they have arrived."

I looked upon a grizzled face, so grim and shocking that not even I could keep my silence for long.

"I know that, prick. Now get back in line," he barked back at the messenger.

"Zaeed Massani, former leader of the Blue Suns, legendary mercenary and most feared mercenary throughout the Terminus sector," I stated, one after the other. I guess I must have popped a cherry when his face soured at the first part of what I said, but he just laughed it off.

"Well, you're a wealth of information," he spat back at me, but something caught my eye and it was already too late.

"Is that Jessie...?" I tilted my head, but then a flash of pain blinded me.

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><p>Chapter 2 up today as promised! So what you think? :P Because i am excited as to what happens next :D<p> 


	3. Request and what's going to come!

Hey, I just wanted to say. I need beta readers and anyone who knows someone who could help me to develop the batarian culture in my story!

I guarantee that this story will dive into places that no ME fanfiction that i've ever seen has dived into before. And the batarians will have a major part to play in this!

Plus i will be introducing few other characters in! Stay tuned! Chapter three is coming in! :P


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